Dai Morgan Evans advised on the construction of the Roman villa in Wroxeter, Shropshire.
Photograph: Alamy

In 2010 the archaeologist Dai Morgan Evans, who has died aged 73 after suffering from cancer, designed a replica Roman villa in Wroxeter, near Shrewsbury, and advised six craftsmen on how to build it. The project, shown on the Channel 4 TV series Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day, used only tools and materials known in the 4th century AD, and drew on a manual from 25BC by the Roman architect Vitruvius and what had been learned from excavating an original building on the site.

The challenges in completing the two-storey structure included erecting a massive timber frame, regulating the under-floor air flows of a hypocaust heating system, laying mosaic floors so that the tiles would stick and setting up a bath house with a plunge pool. The following year the Roman town house at English Heritage’s Wroxeter Roman City site opened its doors to visitors, including a great number of school groups. Walls of one room were left in a variety of stages of completion, so people could see what lay beneath the rendering and fresco finishes, and gain some idea of Roman ingenuity.

Dai was willing to suffer with good humour some of the wildly unhistorical aspects of the TV series because of his belief in the value of experimental archaeology – finding out by doing – and public archaeology - communicating research and ideas to a wide audience. The house at what the Romans knew as Viroconium – once the fourth largest city in Britain – remains open to the public.

Born in West Kirby on the Wirral Peninsula, Merseyside, Dai was the son of David Morgan Evans, a solicitor, and his wife, Betty (nee Massey). He grew up in Chester, where the history teacher at the King’s school in the city encouraged his interest in local history. Summer holidays in St David’s, Pembrokeshire, with its 12th-century cathedral, and participation in digs in Chester ignited his lifelong passion for archaeology. He studied the subject at what is now Cardiff University (1963–66) and pursued postgraduate work on the archaeology of early Welsh poetry until the need to earn a living intervened.

He assisted Leslie Alcock in directing the excavations at South Cadbury, Somerset, looking into claims that this might be the site of Arthur’s Camelot. While the dig results were highly productive in archaeological terms, they did not support the legend.

In 1969 Dai joined the Welsh office of the Inspectorate of Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings in Wales (a responsibility now devolved to Cadw). As one of only three inspectors, he rapidly gained huge experience of dealing with everything from prehistoric barrows to industrial archaeology. The need for “rescue excavations” ahead of development inspired him to gain approval for the establishment of the four Welsh archaeological trusts, a widely admired initiative still going strong after four decades.

As an inspector in London from 1977, Dai worked with government departments, local authorities, national parks and – perhaps most challenging – the Ministry of Defence on Dartmoor and Salisbury Plain. After a prickly start, he gained the confidence of the army, coming to believe that it had been a better protector of history and the environment than farmers would have been.

From 1986, Dai was charged with developing countryside policies and became the English Heritage (as it now was) specialist in public inquiries. In this advocacy role, he won all 14 cases he undertook.

Regarded as a maverick in the civil service, with an impatience about needless bureaucracy and a quick temper, Dai was a surprise choice in 1992 as general secretary of the Society of Antiquaries of London, of which he had been elected a fellow only three years earlier.

However, its then president, Barry Cunliffe, wanted a moderniser. Besides making the Society more welcoming, Dai encouraged young people in particular to use its library and research facilities and aspire to become fellows. He oversaw the installation of its first computer network and a series of talks by fellows and staff on objects from the society’s collection. He also ensured that 50% of the society’s governing council were women. Towards the end of his tenure he began the long battle against government moves to raise the rent for the Burlington House premises shared with the Royal Academy of Arts and other societies.